Parenthetically, why would St Tikhon think he could go into the Greek parish unless he felt that as America’s hierarch he had the right to do so? I don’t believe it’s the wont of Orthodox bishops to waltz into any church they feel like.

Regardless, the point of +Jonah’s sermon was spot-on, in all its particulars. I am presently researching the actual number of American Orthodox parishes in the pre-Bolshevik era to see how many there actually were.

Regardless, a main point of argument you have is that several of the many dozens of non-Metropolia parishes were inaugurated independently and financed independently as such. This is essentially what all parishes in America do and have done since the disestabishment of Church from State. Unless I’m mistaken, none of the Orthodox parishes ever received funding from their respective jurisdictions for the erection of actual churches so simply asserting the fact that Greeks (or Serbs, or Lebanese, etc.) built their churches w/out asking permission of the Metropolia doesn’t add heft to your case.

This opens up a whole other can of worms however: These Albanians/Greeks/Serbs/etc. built their parishes without the permission of anybody in the Old Country either! And many recruited priests of dubious credentials from said Old Country. Are we then to assume that these same parishes are uncanonical? I dread to go down this road as it opens up whether the mysteries celebrated there were valid. It is equally clear however that had proper canonical order been followed we would not have to ask these questions at all.

One thing I can be sure of: no jurisdiction was here before the Russian one. Regardless of how small it may have been (again, an open question), it makes absolutely no difference. The original Moravian Mission of Cyril and Methodius was probably no more than 100 people. If the GOAA/EP wants to make the case that there was no Orthodox presence in America, then they should go ahead and make it. They won’t because they can’t.

With great respect, I humbly state that I have heard these arguments you present before. If they are true and pre-Bolshevik unity was a myth, why then was it ever necessary for His All Holiness to invoke the infamous Canon 28? If your presentation of history is correct, why would he need to. Couldn’t he simply let history be presented by revealing these true? Couldn’t he reveal these primary sources and abolish this “myth”?

I too have read Mr. Michalopulos’ book, with disclosure I am proud to know him as a friend, but I have never seen evidence presented ever to the contrary of what is stated in his book. A book I believe to be well researched and objective.

Based on primary sources, only a small handful (not “many”) of Greek parishes received anything at all from the Russian hierarchy.

In any event, calling it a “schism” is a canonical judgment, one based on the assumption that sending Russian missionaries to Russian Alaska gave the Russian church jurisdiction all the way down to Florida, across the then territory of multiple colonial powers. Of course, this is by no means an agreed-upon evaluation.

I’m not arguing either way on this question, only commenting on the historical reality, which is that the pre-Bolshevik situation of Orthodoxy in America was far from united. Contrary to Metr. Jonah’s comments, the non-Russian portion was by no means a tiny minority.

To be honest, every time I look at them or at scholarship based directly on them, I find the support for a pre-Bolshevik Russian hegemony to be more and more, as we say, a “myth.” It’s not even clear that Russia itself regarded America as its exclusive territory. (For example, after 1867, there was a move to close down the Russian vicariate in America, according to a letter from St. Innocent, since in their opinion Alaska was no longer part of Russia’s canonical territory.)

I have, by the way, read your book that you wrote with Dcn. Ezra, and while I do appreciate what you were trying to accomplish, I hope that you’ll work more with primary sources in your next foray into the field. One of the big problems with historiography in American Orthodoxy has been a constant use of repetition from secondary sources, such that certain ideas — such as the myth of pre-Bolshevik unity — keep getting repeated without anything to back them up. (Ironically enough, it was most likely Fr. Boris Burden, one of Aftimios Ofiesh’s henchmen, who probably invented the myth.)

There is a move by several historians here in America to form a historical society dedicated to research and publishing in the field. Perhaps you might be interested.

Your numbers are inacurate as well. By 1900 there were at least 12 Serbian parishes alone. I’ll be glad to check the other numbers. As for the Greeks not being part of the Metropolia, that is incorrect if you’re making a categorical statement. Many Greeks (and Greek parishes) were part of the Metropolia and received their articles, vestments, and even stipehds from them. Some of course were not. This however is a sign of schism and trying to call it the “myth of unity” shows how chagrine we of the ethnic jurisdictions are about this fact.

Even if we said that these parishes were not the product of schism per se, they were the product of an extra-canonical, parallel process which leaves one with a queasy feeling as regards to canonicity. Again: why did not the EP set up parishes in Siberia? Siberia wasn’t a part of Russia for a long time. Why not China? or Japan? These were never part of the Russian state. It’s clear that the EP could have but chose instead to honor Russia’s evangelistic effort which was already undergoing in those lands. So too did Patriarh Joachim III honor Moscow’s claim to North America.

As for Metropolitan Jonah’s sermon, it was beautiful and truthful. Churches that are more concerned with long-dead empires have forfeited the Gospel. The Holy Spirit will not go where it is not wanted.

I was converted to Orthodoxy and ordained to the priesthood in post-communist Romania. As far as being integrated, I felt as integrated as a foreigner could possibly be. Still, for some, I was suspected as a spy; for some, I was resented as an intruder; for some, I was beloved as an adopted son, brother, and eventually father; for some, I was revered as a gift of grace; for some, perhaps I was even exploited as a trophy.

For me, Orthodoxy as a way of life, and as an organic and inseparable element of local culture, and as a single administrative unity, was the norm until I returned to this country. That is not to say that it was in any way characterized by UNIFORMITY. Rather, all the things that here in America cause us to cling to the separation and protection of our jurisdictional niches, all of them were (and still are) encompassed within a single local and national Orthodoxy.

If any kind of unity ever comes to Orthodoxy in America, it will be in spite of our very complex and multi-faceted differences, and in spite of our interests in preserving them. It will certainly not eliminate them. Perhaps it is we ourselves who are the greatest obstacle to unity, not Constantinople or Moscow or Antioch or Bucharest.

I tend to think that the only way forward is to put on blinders and focus on our mission in America. Although if we could agree on the mission of Orthodoxy in America, we probably would already be united. Perhaps the lines need to be re-drawn, perhaps the problem needs to be re-defined; perhaps a totally new paradigm needs to break through, one that can accommodate all of the above. There is nothing new under the sun, no challenges that have not in principle been successfully overcome in the past.

Consider the cultural and linguistic fault-lines that threatened the unity of the Church in Acts 6:1, or the conservative versus innovative clash that could have divided the Church in Acts 15.

Metropolitan Jonah is not calling everyone to join the OCA; he is hinting at new wineskins and perhaps new paradigms. What is defective about the OCA’s autocephaly is that it was granted to one of many jurisdictions existing in parallel at the same time and in the same place. As such, it was perhaps as much a provocation as it was a solution. I’m not suggesting an annulment, as might be granted in an unconsummated marriage, but simply remarking on the obvious; whether we call the OCA autocephalous or autonomous, it has not been an adequate solution to the complex situation of Orthodoxy in America. But if Metropolitan Jonah recognizes that, then we may be well on our way out of this impasse.

In His Beatitude’s words: “It is imperative for us to come together. Not for all the other churches, the Antiochians and the Serbians and the Bulgarians and the Romanians and everyone, to join the OCA, but to come together in a new organization of Orthodoxy in North American that brings us all together as one Church, even just pulling together all our existing organizations so that all the bishops sit on one Synod, so that all the Metropolitans get together on a special Synod or something like that.”

Since we do have a very long way to go in terms of an organic, coherent American Orthodoxy that encompasses diversity in unity, thank God that Metropolitan Jonah is calling us to A REALISTIC STEP, as contrasted with the recent call from Constantinople. It is not about prerogatives; it is about mission.

As far as I know, a cypress is a tree. Cyprus is an island and a country in the eastern Mediterranean, where I live.

In 1890, there were only two Orthodox churches in the Lower 48. Thirty years later, there were 250. About half of the people were Greek, who had nothing to do with the Russian administration.

Look for the paper being published sometime soon in St. Vlad’s Quarterly by Matthew Namee called “The Myth of Unity,” which should put to rest this oft-repeated error that there ever was united jurisdiction in America. (Mind you, this is a different question from what “ought” to have been done, which we must leave to the canonists.)